142 : The Atlantic 



the route to India he was not given command of this voyage. This was 

 assigned to Vasco da Gama, a man of wealth and position, who 

 had assiduously sought the favor of the king. 



While Diaz was not powerful enough to claim his just reward, he 

 was still so important and so well informed that he would not be 

 neglected. He was assigned to assist in preparing the ships and expe- 

 dition and da Gama had the full benefit of his advice and his knowl- 

 edge of navigation. Diaz made the voyage as far as the Canary Islands 

 but there he was ignominiously left behind while da Gama made the 

 broad sweep through the Atlantic and around the Cape to East Africa 

 and India. 



Later it was Diaz's fate to assist another voyager to fame. In 1500 

 he helped Cabral organize his expedition to India and was in com- 

 mand of one of the vessels. They touched at the Cape Verde Islands 

 and then, in keeping with the ideas of navigation that Diaz seems 

 to have developed, they swung boldly out into the Atlantic before 

 heading south. It was on this trip that Cabral and Diaz made an 

 important and independent discovery of the eastern projection of 

 South America. The record says that they were carried to this point 

 by a succession of storms which would be augmented also by the pre- 

 vailing westerly set of the surface currents. As we have already 

 noted, this explanation is in keeping with the character and structure 

 of the Atlantic Ocean. 



Attempts have been made to demonstrate that the Portuguese at 

 this time already knew of the existence of the South American coast 

 and that they shrouded their knowledge in secrecy, but there is no 

 conclusive evidence on this point. In any event, Diaz was the first 

 man to have touched both the shores of the South Atlantic and it was 

 upon this discovery of the South American coast that the Portuguese 

 later successfully based their claim to the occupation and colonization 

 of Brazil. Leaving the Brazilian coast the Cabral fleet crossed the 

 ocean to the Cape of Good Hope where Diaz and his ship were lost 

 in storms while rounding this great landmark of the world which 

 he had discovered. 



The fate of the Portuguese Empire in the east is not an inherent 

 part of this story. It is pertinent, however, to point out that the Portu- 

 guese ships were the first vessels built on Atlantic shores to circulate 

 freely in the world's other oceans. In 1501 da Gama took a fleet to the 

 mouth of the Red Sea and to India with the intention of blocking 

 the Red Sea route and after that, for a period, the Portuguese had the 

 Indian water and the Indian trade for themselves. Four years later. 



